Dear Editor,
On January 8, 2023, ExxonMobil, and its consultant, Accorn, jointly published a notice as per Section 11 of the Environmental Protection Act advising the public that an Environmental Impact
Assessment was submitted for Exxon Mobil’s application for an Environmental Permit for its Uaru offshore oil and gas production floating platform. This notice advises the public that “the EIA/EIS are available on the EPA’s zfor download” and that the public has until sixty-days from January 8, 2023, to make written submissions on the Environmental Impact Assessment as they see appropriate.
More than two thirds of the 60-day period have elapsed, and the EPA still has not posted the certified EIA/EIS on its website for the public to inspect. The document presently labelled in the url link as “UARU EIA” bears no specific date, no signed sheet of authorship or ownership, and no clear title page. The top of the first page of the document carries the text: “VOLUME I: Introduction, Project Description and Baseline Environmental Impact Statement (Executive Summary)
Abbreviations/Units, Acronyms and Glossary, Table of Contents”. If this is Volume 1, presumably there are other volumes that are not included on the website?
The posting of an incomplete and unsigned EIA on the government website is a violation of the public’s right to fair consultation and the rule of law. It raises a serious question about the transparency and accountability of the process. I hereby request that the EPA immediately provide the full and duly certified EIA on the website and restart the 60-day count down from the date at which the certified EIA is available to the public.
The government has a responsibility to not only provide complete and accurate information to the public in a timely and accessible manner, but also to guarantee that the information contained in an EIA is attested to by the consultant that prepared the EIA as well as the applicant for the permit, so that these parties may not disavow the contents later.
A letter to this effect has been sent to Mr Kemraj Parsram, Executive Director, Environmental Protection Agency.
Yours sincerely,
Simone Mangal-Joly
